Chapter 3

It was about a week later, I was sat in my study when HL came in followed by a young woman.

"This," she announced, "is Annabelle Pargetter, and she is going to be our new secretary. Annabelle this is my husband."

Annabelle stepped forward and I smiled and shook her hand. Or rather I grasped a piece of damp, limp fish, which moved almost imperceptibly.

"How do you do?" I said. "I assume that my wife has everything organised for you and has told you what's wanted?"

"Yes," she replied.

HL was standing slightly behind her with a smile on her face. I just glanced at her and the smile broadened just slightly. What is she up to, I wondered. Then she ushered Annabelle out and looked at me as she closed the door.

"I'll see you later," and she was gone.

Well, blow me, that was a surprise. I have to admit that I had half expected her to organise a male secretary, just to give the other girls something to, um ... lust after? Whatever, I wasn't expecting anything like Annabelle. The reason for the shock? Annabelle was of above average height, say five nine, and pencil thin. She appeared to have no tits or bum, and little in the way of waist. She was so blonde that you could barely detect any hair colour at all, her eyes were hidden behind frameless tinted glasses, palest of blues I thought, and her complexion held almost no colour either. Her face was in fact strikingly attractive with a fine bone structure and fine features, but what her teeth were like I couldn't say because her smile had been so slight it hadn't exposed them. She was dressed in a well fitted black pants suit and wore black shoes with a small heel. Had I wanted a governess she might well have fitted the bill. Sexy she wasn't.

I didn't see Her Loveliness until dinner that evening.

"Interesting choice of secretary," I commented.

"She grinned. "Yes, I thought so. She comes highly recommended."

"Yes, but people sometimes do that just to get rid of them."

"She has had some difficulties, but she is very well qualified, and no, before you state the obvious, I'm sure she's not a lesbian, but she'll be a real challenge for you. Most of the other women have just been pushovers."

"You've not been doing too badly yourself, by all accounts. In fact none of you have. Mind you, I'm not at all sure that this is a challenge I wish to rise to."

"Pull the other one sweetie, if it's got a pussy and it's breathing, you're interested."

Which, I fear, is only too true.

I had spent some time in the cellar. Under the pretext of improving the lighting, I had run an additional electric circuit down, and had taken it through into the torture chamber. I didn't want to use the original oil lamps because they must have been smoky and unpleasant, although there was some ventilation, and indeed an air supply for the fireplace, I felt that it would be better to use electricity. I had located some wall lights that gave the same sort of effect as oil lamps would, and had installed these in their place. The wiring was quite unobtrusive and the effect of the lights was very gothic. I had also spent a while in the attics to see if I could come up with any clues as to what why and who.

The who was solved fairly quickly when I discovered a wardrobe full of dominatrix gear. Quite startling stuff when one considers the era in which it was made, but then the French ... Ah, I've given it away, yes, it was all in Giselle's sizes, it would not have fitted Harriet/Harcourt who was fairly tall and had a larger shoe size. But who the victim, or were the victims I had no idea. When you put this together with what HL had found out though, about all the relationships, and particularly how the 'marriage' began and where, an interesting scenario began to emerge.

Perhaps the General, or Colonel as he was then, had been introduced to Mademoiselle de la Mettisse, and she had tried a little domination and bondage with him and discovered his little secret. It would probably have suited her, because her parents would have wanted her to marry, and she, as a lesbian would have had the best of all possible worlds. A 'husband' who was under her thumb, and could be controlled, and the approval of her family. Given that eventually, in 1886 there was an heir to the estates, albeit not quite as one might expect, but few knew that, everyone was happy. This would suppose that rather than the General building the house, it was in fact the creation of Giselle, perhaps the original 'Goth'. Certainly a woman to be reckoned with, bit like Her Loveliness.

I'd never tried bondage, or sado-masochism, so I had no idea what I was going to do with the torture chamber, but I have to say that over the next few weeks a candidate for some experimentation began to present itself. Or rather herself. Annabelle had duly started work and HL put her in another of the smaller rooms in which she had a computer and telephone installed. We had apparently a broadband connection with a wireless router, I say apparently because this is an area of expertise that is closed to me. She was proving to be very efficient, but I was finding her a pain in the butt. Unlike HL, who seemed to have a sixth sense and avoided interrupting me when I was dallying with one of the ladies, Annabelle seemed intent on disrupting my pleasures.

Other things were shaping up nicely, all the ladies were under the same gynaecologist, a chap that we had known for some years, including Rose who had, with sparkling eyes, told me that I had put her 'in the club'.

"Might be twins or triplets the way you go at it, She laughed, and went on to say that now I'd have to support her. She was now living in one of the cottages, so that made it handy for her to get to work. I explained to her that I was delighted and would look after her, and we were just about to seal the deal as it were when that bloody woman came in. Dumped some papers, and left with a sniff. This put Rose off, and I was determined to think of some way to put Annabelle in her place.

She wasn't proving popular with the rest of the ladies either, particularly Chrissie, who she put down unmercifully, and Emma, who she regarded as 'outside staff' and therefore beyond the pale. I voiced my thoughts to HL, but she seemed not to be interested. In fact she was waiting for me to work out what to do myself, and she was waiting to see how long it took me to get in the saddle.

The final straw came one morning when she came in with some post.

"I suppose you're thinking of raping me as well," she snarled, banging it down.

"I've never raped anyone in my life," I retorted, "Nor will I. If you want shagging dear you just have to ask."

"All these women here, they're no better than whores, I don't know how your lovely wife puts up with it. And you've got them all pregnant too, and that Chrissie's a horrid little tart."

Well that did it. I leapt to my feet and grabbed hold of her. She might report me for assault, but I reckoned that the ladies would support my story, whatever it was. I frog marched her out to the laundry room. This was quite a big room with a drying cabinet and a couple of those big airers that have ropes and pulleys to take them up to the ceiling. Chrissie was there doing some ironing.

"Chrissie, lower that airer right down, please."

Chrissie saw what I had hold of and leapt to it with a glint in her eye.

When the airer was down I pulled Annabelle's arms above her head and Chrissie assisted me in tying her hands to the outer rails. I then moved smartly to the end of the rope and hoisted her up until her feet were only just on the floor.

She fought and struggled and threatened every inch of the way, Chrissie and I both had bruised shins, and I had a couple of scratches.

Once she was hoisted up she changed to pleading. She wouldn't say anything to anyone if we let her go, and that sort of thing. Did she really think we would believe her?